Walter Cromwell grew up as a brewer, smith, and fuller in Putney. He had an elder brother named John, who moved to Lambeth and settled down there to a quiet and prosperous life as a brewer, later, according to Chapuys, becoming cook to the Archbishop of Canterbury[7]. Walter, however, remained in Wimbledon, and appears to have been a most quarrelsome and riotous character. Most of the entries in the Court Rolls concerning him are records of small fines incurred for petty offences. Forty-eight times between 1475 and 1501 was he forced to pay sixpence for breaking the assize of ale. In order to prevent the sale of bad beer in those days, an ale-taster was appointed to pass, or condemn as unfit, all brewing in the parish. Walter Cromwell did not go to the ale-taster before he drew and sold his beer, and for failing so to do was fined as aforesaid. There is also record that he was not seldom drunk. In 1477 a penalty of twenty pence was inflicted on him for assaulting and drawing blood from William Michell, and he and his father were very often brought before the court on the charge of ‘overburthening’ the public land in Putney with their cattle, and cutting more than their share of the furze and thorns there[8]. But in spite of all these petty misdemeanours, Walter Cromwell appears to have been a man of property and influence in Wimbledon, and the Court Rolls in 1480 show that he then possessed two virgates of land in Putney parish. To these were added six more virgates in 1500 by grant of Archbishop Morton[9]. Walter Cromwell was also made Constable of Putney in 1495[10], and his name constantly occurs in the Court Rolls as decenarius and juryman[11]. Towards the end of his life, however, his character appears to have become so bad that he forfeited all his position and property in Wimbledon. In 1514 he ‘falsely and fraudulently erased the evidences and terrures of the lord,’ so that the bedell was commanded ‘to seize into the lord’s hands all his copyholds held of the lord and to answer the lord of the issue[12].’ This is the last mention of the name of Walter Cromwell in the Wimbledon Manor Rolls.